Tag: Depression

I know we haven’t really used this in a while, because we’ve become more involved with YouTube, but I (Tim) just wanted to give an update.

Following our YouTube shows a bit of us, but the truth is we’re always facing trails in our lives. Be it health (both mental and physical), money, feeling safe, or even being able to function, Emily and I are in a constant battle to maintain a normal life. Emily fights harder than I do, and my fight takes a deeper toll on me than her’s does.

The problem isn’t that we’re unhappy together, far from it, the problem is together we’re fighting in a world that seems unaccepting. Her father doesn’t really believe that Emily is sick. More or less, he believes she’s just becoming like her mother: something of a hypochondriac. I swear to you, with ever fiber of my being, I hate him for feeling this way.

Emily’s step-mother is worse though. Her step-mother is something of a ‘social-alcoholic’, and by that I mean she’s an obnoxious wino/drunk who lashes out verbally at Emily’s father and all of his ties to Emily (including Emily’s sister). From my side, I think of her as a blemish on the world, an ugly spot, that radiates sadness, anger, and negativity around her general vicinity.

That being said, I have a constant twinge of anger when I think of her father and step-mother, but I try to contain it, because I’m not helping by being so angry at them. Emily is so sweet, so idealistic, that she only feels sorry for them for not being able to be happy. I am so negative, that sometimes I can’t fathom how she doesn’t hate her father and step-mother.

I love Emily. I want to (and will) spend my life with her. But, going back to what I initially was saying, we’re in a constant battle.

Emily recently upped her Lyrica (a medicine for fibromyalgia) and it helps, but she’s still very weak, and unable to function. She told me yesterday something along the lines of she needs to space out her days with people other than me, because even talking to others leaves her with fatigue and pain.

I wish I could take her pain away, take her away from here, and give her the life she deserves. Sadly, I face every day knowing that we’ll live paycheck to paycheck in order to maintain this very simple life we live.

Hey guys, I uploaded a new video a few days ago! This kind of video style is something I’ve been wanting to do for a while, and I would really appreciate your feedback 🙂 The past few days have been rough, but I’m working on staying positive.

My depression has been running deeper lately and I can’t seem to put a stopper on it. I feel like it’s because we live in Bloomsburg, surrounded by people who hate us, with Emily’s family.

Darren (Emily’s dad) is never supportive of Emily to the degree she deserves. He hates us being together, is never proud of her, and acts more like a semi-friend to her than anything. Then there’s Jenn (Emily’s Evil step-mother). Jenn treats Darren, Aubrey (Emily’s Sister), (and especially) Emily and I like we’re shit. She’s an alcoholic, ignorant, and angry all of the time. Sometimes I think of Jenn and begin to clench my fists and grind my teeth. Emily has even told me she wants Darren to leave Jenn. If I were to express who the biggest problem in this whole thing is, I’d have to point to Jenn. Last time I talked to Darren, even he said, ‘Jenn is the type of person to hold a grudge for 30-years.’

Living in the same town as these people is enough to drive my depression deeper, but it doesn’t end there. Jenn and Darren have a lot of friends (mainly because Jenn has a huge white-trash family and Darren is a somewhat-musician) and all of their friends, when they see Emily and I, look at us with disgust of outright ignore us. One recent instance of this was when Kara (Darren’s 1st cousin he cheated on Sandra (Emily’s mom) with) saw me in a grocery store and gave me a look that made me feel like I killed her family, then curtly turned into a lane and hid there for a bit. I went and got Emily and told her this and she went with me to the lane. When Kara saw us together she said ‘Hi.’ with no emotion and walked off and out of our lives.

Emily takes this stuff better than me; I’m guessing because she’s been surrounded by these people her whole life and never felt like her father was close to her and truly never liked Jenn. Emily’s told me before that I came into the picture and seemed like her only chance at happiness. That felt sad for some reason, but now I get it.

So my previous Doctor finally prescribed me a months worth of oxy. This happened because my mother actually called and demanded to speak to a supervisor (like a boss), and worked some magic to get the nurse to call me. She informed me that she simply “figured” I would call back, and was very sorry. Apparently the perscription had been sitting in the office for a few days (which is a lie because the script had the date that I came to pick it up written on it).

They filled the 10 mg for four times a day, but since I went through withdraw, my tolerance was down. So since then I’ve been taking half of a pill 4-5 times a day, depending on the day. This is purely due to me being on survival mode and not knowing when I will get a good doctor. Truth is I haven’t been doing good at all. Tim talked in his last post about me being unsure about my fibromyalgia diagnosis, and that is where I’m at. You can check out his post to go further into that topic.

Lately I’ve been using this stuff called Perform by Biofreeze. It helps numb the painful areas a bit, and kind of distract you from the pain. Pluto (our Morkie puppy) goes crazy over the minty scent of it. I’ve also been trying to use Advil in between the oxy. Fun, fun, fun..

Speaking of pain medicine..the CDC recently had public comments open for the Proposed Guideline for Prescribing Opioids for Chronic Pain. I posted my comment and I wanted to share it here. It’s also on my tumblr if you want to reblog and make a change.

I am a 19 year old girl who has suffered with chronic pain since the age of 10. Although my case is rare, I am not alone, and I am speaking for everyone young and suffering. Doctors hear me speaking about my pain and all they ever hear is the opioids. Over the counter medication is a joke, and the fibromyalgia based meds are not effective. I am bluntly told that I will be in pain for the rest of my life, but that I should learn to live with it. What you must understand is Taking opioids helps me get out of bed, perform on stage as a singer, see a movie with my boyfriend, and stop crying in the middle of the night from a flare up.The rules are so strict, that I’ve been treated like a drug seeker when I show up in the ER screaming in pain because my doctor didn’t want to be involved with narcotics anymore. Being denied a new doctors office simply because an opioid was in my medication list and they “Did not want to get involved in that”. I am not a drug addict, and neither are the sweet girls I’ve talked to and seen on social media. Many of these young people use canes and take back braces or stuffed animals to the movies to ease the pain, and we are doing these things along with taking prescribed opioids improve the quality of our lives. ♡

I know it’s been a long time since I’ve written anything or even done anything with this blog. Recently Emily has been back and fourth with doctors and dealing with her pain. It’s recently come into question whether or not she has fibromyalgia or something else entirely. To be very honest, the question has been posed more by her and I than any doctors (because all of her doctors don’t want to figure this out or, seemingly, even want to deal with her). So, what brought this generic diagnosis into question?…

Well, fibromyalgia has a few core characteristics that seem to be universal:

Exercise exasperates pains, causing extreme fatigue and increased pain during and after activity

No tingling or coldness in hands (although sweaty hands happens on occasion)

Generally speaking, the most common problem people with fibromyalgia face is overall body pains, and that is the only thing we’ve recognized her having in common with this diagnosis. Her daily pain is acute and widespread. I worry about her day in and day out, but without highly involved medical attention she remains on the pill that seem to cause her more woes than anything else: Oxycodone.

Doctors have treated her like a junkie, yelled at her, belittled her, and even made her suicidal. One of the hardest parts of this for her has been finding support. There are times even I don’t like that she’s taking these pills. I’ve felt this way not due to what the pills are or what they can do, but because of how people view her when she takes them. Even her father remains unaware of what she takes, and by her own omission, knowing he would think less of her for it.

I am 27, she is 19, and we both came together in a world that hates ‘us’. Since our union we’ve found solace in being with each other and loving one another, while also facing demonizing remarks on a near weekly basis. We live in a small town that offers little more to us than her family (of whom only 1, her mother, openly supports us and understands what she is going through). Some days I want to die, and on others her willingness to live is gone; but on each of those days we find ourselves supporting each other to keep going. Without her… Without us… I hate to think about it.

Sorry It’s been a while since I posted, but things have been rather hectic lately. Christmas has passed, and now we are in the new year. I’ve been pretty honest with you all about my pain medicine, as It is a medicine that I take for the right reason. I have no reason to hide it, and I find it unfortunate that words like “oxy”, “Morphine”, or really anything other than Advil is a dirty word. When my doctor first started prescribing me my oxy, he informed me that he couldn’t do it long term, and if this was part of a longterm treatment plan, that I would have to find a different doctor. I understood, and he continued to fill my prescription for months. Right before Christmas, I called in to get a refill, and I was informed that I would have to find another doctor. My time with them was up, and suddenly, I was left with very little medicine and a lot of anxiety. I was calling doctor after doctor to try and find anyone that would take me in, and this was not an easy task. I’m still waiting for a doctor to come back from vacation so that I can see him.

This holiday season has been a big struggle for me. I’ve gone from taking four 10 mg a day, to two 5 mg tablets a day, and I’m barely functioning. At one point, crying in pain, My boyfriend took me to a new E.R. and the doctor I saw was so cruel to me, he was a line away from calling me a junkie. “You don’t come here for that, you are in charge of your meds. Find a new dealer within the next 48 hours. I don’t wanna see you here ever again, okay?” He yelled and then slammed the door before I could even get a word in. My boyfriend helped me out of the hospital sobbing my eyes out, still in pain, both body and mind.

This kind of treatment for people with chronic pain makes me sick. It’s inhumane to talk to someone like that or to judge someone based on their illness. We are not drug seekers, we aren’t junkies, we don’t enjoy this.

Right now I’m in the middle of just trying to hold on, stay calm, and find people that understand. Good hearted people, who want to come up with a longterm plan for me. In the mean time I’ll turn my heating pad on, take an anxitey pill, two Advil, and sip on some Jasmine green tea.

Although I generally don’t like talking about my dreams, I feel like looking back on them sometimes. Dreams are the writing on the walls of the brain spoken back to us. We hear them, we see them, and we try to interpret them. I genuinely believe that no interpretation of a dream is wrong, so long as that interpretation isn’t aiming to be wrong. But what are the dreams I have? The dreams of a person with no foresight or interest in knowing the future; what are my dreams?

My dreams come at me like a heavy flood, in which I drown in them. I gasp for air as the images of my past, strangely familiar faces, and scenarios I’ve never experienced was over me. My latest dreams included: Emily’s death, a tangible string connecting all parts of my life, my abstract home with doors that lock to open, and a crisis of the existential nature. My dreams are subtle as a slap to the face. I often wake up momentarily distraught or sad. When I was really young I remember waking up happy. What ever happened to that? Does growing up take that away from us?

I’ve dreamt about pleasures that were within grasp, but my mind willed to not to achieve them. All too often I dream about loss. Loss within a dream is real, because when I wake up I know that loss is still there. My body is a cage, and my mind is the sight between the bars.

This stream of consciousness is a nightly occurrence, and, although it sounds hellish, I can’t wait to get back to sleep some nights.

Tim has Bipolar Disorder, which leads him to go into bouts of depression. Even though he is medicated, there are still manic and depressive episodes that happen. Today was Halloween. I dressed up as a Unicorn and he dressed up as a cool dark Skeleton/death/ unique all black costume. We trick or treated a bit before my Fibro kicked in and told me to go back home. It wasn’t a big deal, we still had fun, and spend the rest of the night relaxing and watching one of Tim’s Favorite shows. Mug brownies, candy, chips, Vegan Mac and Cheese; I enjoyed myself! In my eyes, it was a very good day.

However when we went to lay down, something was off about my Puffin. He seemed a little distant and standoffish. I would start talking about positive dreams I had for our future home, and he kept shutting them down, not even jokingly. I would ask him to come up with other fun ideas and he just wasn’t up for joining in. I figured maybe he wasn’t in the mood for chatting right away so I checked my phone for a bit, and then scrolled over to vine for a bit. Usually vine breaks the ice and can loosen Tim up a bit. I heard him laughing at some of the clips, so soon I lightly pounced wanting to cuddle with my Puffin. He was still acting odd, and I was starting to think i had done something wrong. He wasn’t smiling and when i asked him what was wrong me moodily shrugged. This is where I started biting my lip with anxiety. I had to have done something wrong right?

We just were lying there for what felt like forever, looking at each other occasionally. I asked him if there was something I could do, and he seemed slightly annoyed at this concept. “What do you mean?” he would say, “I..um..well I wanted to just talk to you about ya know, light stuff. ” I responded. He shot me a look as if I should have already known what he was about to say, “I have nothing to say.” The monotone in his voice worried me, because didn’t know where he was mentally right then. Again, lay still for a while, he closed his eyes, while mine where wide open searching for something to say. Finally, with teary eyes I kissed his lips and my love opened his eyes “I’m sorry you are sad, and I’m sorry If I did anything to cause i-” before I could even finish, Tim stopped me, “No, No, Honey, you did nothing wrong..” He grabbed my shaking jaw lightly in his hands ,”..Don’t ever think that, you are perfect my darling. I love you so much.” I burst out in the tears I had been holding and tried to mumble things through tears like “..B-but I wish I could help you..I wish there was something I can do.” He shushed and hushed me like a caring lover should and quickly calmed me. “Sweety, I just get like this somethings you know? There’s nothing you did, don’t ever think that.” I nodded and kissed him multiple times. I asked him if he needed sleep (Which he said yes) and I said I would hang out on my phone with him until he feel asleep I love my Puffin with all of my heart, and I make it my mission to be as helpful as possible with his own issues. Sometimes Tim feels sad and he has no idea why. That’s okay, it’s going to happen. As time go on I will learn how to deal with it even better, but soon will make a full list of tips when your Lover is Bipolar..If anyone’s interested 😉

I’ve tried to kill myself many times over. I cut, burned, and mutilated my body for many years. One of my earliest memories involves me lying in a bedroom alone and crying, thinking about death. The memory is so strong not because of the content, but the feeling; It wasn’t fear, but more of an envy. Death, for a younger me, was a goal. I didn’t want to overcome death, I just wanted to achieve it on my own terms.

I’ve always felt somewhat outcast in my family. My dad is a psychologist of sorts, my mom held multiple positions in colleges and has spoken all over the country, my brother played trumpet, even in the Lincoln Center and in a few places in this country (though he stopped cold and now holds a government job that leaves him well off), and me? I had a brain, but maybe was born in the wrong time or place. At a young age I thought a lot about science.

I used to come up with theories pertaining to time, gravity, and the history of the universe and beyond. My parents saw me as intelligent, but riddled with depression and my ideas were manic obsessions, rants of the insane. Years later (and I mean over this past year) I came to learn a lot of my theories were now being studied, and were known as quantum theory involving superstrings. Science lulled my depression into a minor buzzing, but my parents quickly quashed those dreams. At night they used to talk about me, worriedly, and I would listen.

My ideas, to them, were a sign of me becoming a schizoid. Through multiple hospital trips, in which I spent months of my life being watched by doctors, I lost the fascination I once held and simply became just another over-medicated person. The fact of the matter is I do need medicine, because if I don’t take it I will kill myself (I still have suicidal thoughts, but more like bad dreams than like the serious ideas they once were).

Through all of this, a small part of my broken mind still considers grander things than my life, but I no longer hold that curiosity I once held. I hate this fact, and I hate that I lost something that comforted me so strongly. People say that ‘youth needs to be cherished’ or something along those lines, but not my youth. I chose a razor over a pen far to quickly, and for that I lost a part of me I loved.